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The Challenge

Wildlife trade can bring significant benefits to communities and governments, but over-exploitation undermines its long-term viability and the livelihoods of people who depend on it. Countries work together through the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and other multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) to manage the international trade at sustainable levels.

To achieve this national authorities need access to accurate and scientifically rigorous information on the conservation status, management and trade levels of wildlife species. They also need capacity to undertake their own analyses of trade data. However, this information can be difficult to access and national capacity to carry out assessments is often insufficient.

Our solution & impact

We work closely with governments to provide them with assessments and analyses that help inform their wildlife management. We aim to ensure that national authorities have access to the best available information and the capacity to access, interpret and use relevant data. We provide this support in several ways:

We carry out species reviews, to assess the conservation status, management regimes and trade levels of species of concern. As part of the CITES Review of Significant Trade – a key process to ensure the biological sustainability of the legal wildlife trade – we undertake species assessments and identify species that may be at risk.

We analyse CITES trade data to identify species where further assessments may be required to ensure that trade does not negatively impact wildlife populations.

We provide advice to the European Commission’s Scientific Review Group on the implementation of the EU Wildlife Trade regulations and on the sustainability of wildlife imports to the European Union.

We help build capacity building among national wildlife authorities to ensure that staff who manage the wildlife trade can access relevant information and undertake appropriate analyses. We are assisting a number of Central American countries and the Dominican Republic to analyse CITES trade data and undertake sustainability assessments.

We assist the Secretariats of several MEAs to analyse the national reports submitted by their Parties.

Expertise & Team

Our team combines scientific and technical expertise in the diverse fields of international wildlife trade, taxonomy, wildlife management, international biodiversity conventions, data analysis and capacity building.

Partners & Donors

We work directly with agencies of national governments that are Parties to CITES. The European Union, the CITES Secretariat and the United States Department of the Interior support our work financially. We also receive valuable expert advice and information from partners worldwide.